Democratic disaster shapes up as a boost for Andrew Cuomo

ALBANY — His longtime friend Hillary Clinton was handed a stunning upset in her bid for the presidency. Republicans continue to control a majority in both houses of Congress. His efforts to help Democrats win the state Senate are sputtering toward failure.

Yet Tuesday's results may have been just what Gov. Andrew Cuomo's career needed.

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Clinton’s unexpected defeat will hit the reset button within the national Democratic Party in a way that puts Cuomo, a self-styled centrist and populist Democrat, in the mix for 2020. And continued Republican control of the state Senate — likely to be buttressed, again, by the chamber’s Independent Democratic Conference — keeps a system in place that has worked perfectly well for Cuomo during the last six years.

“He never had it so good,” said Hank Sheinkopf, a political consultant who advised the governor’s 2014 re-election bid.

The governor himself was quiet between a 10:30 p.m. appearance outside Clinton’s election night party on Tuesday night at the Javits Center and a 4:30 p.m. phone interview on Wednesday with the NY1 cable network. In a 10-minute exchange, Cuomo said his "friend" Clinton’s loss made for an “emotional day,” but that he had already conducted a pleasant conversation with President-elect Donald Trump about his own plans to upgrade the state’s transportation infrastructure.

Lewis Dodley, the anchor, asked Cuomo about his role in the national Democratic firmament as it undergoes self-diagnostics and repairs. Cuomo’s answer outlined the “New York philosophy,” which is that “we believe in individual rights, but we believe in the collective.” He then talked about his accomplishments over six years in office, including the legalization of same-sex marriage and increasing the minimum wage to $15 in many parts of the state.

Asked if he would play a role in national party affairs, Cuomo replied: “I see a role for myself as governor of the state of New York.”

Erie County Democratic chairman Jeremy Zellner had a more succinct answer when reached by phone on Wednesday: “Absolutely.”

After years of gridlock and divided government in Washington, Zellner explained, Cuomo could offer a counternarrative. His basic political story involves reaching across the political aisle and getting big things done.

“People want government to work, and that’s definitely a huge positive for our governor,” Zellner said. “I hope we can continue moving this state forward.”

Ostensibly, Cuomo’s decision this cycle to raise money for Senate Democratic challengers and endorse select candidates was ideological. The governor said he had worked well with Republicans, but needed a Democratic Legislature to implement public campaign financing, extend tuition assistance programs to undocumented immigrants, raise the age of criminal responsibility and limit lawmakers’ outside income.

Progressives have long dreamed of these policies, but considered Cuomo a fair weather ally at best. Leaders of the state’s institutional left wing issued statements mourning the setbacks to these priorities.

“It’s impossible to put a positive spin on last night’s results,” Citizen Action executive director Karen Scharff wrote in an email. “I couldn’t sleep last night, and woke up this morning heartbroken.”

Republicans, many of whom suspected this year was more about the governor’s left flank than about a genuine ideological split, said they were ready to move along without any hard feelings.

“My thoughts are simply this: my relationship with Andrew Cuomo is not going to change one iota. I deal with him when I deal with him and his position knowing full well that the only consideration that he has on any issue is which way that issue is going to be assisting him politically at that moment,” Senate deputy majority leader John DeFrancisco, a Republican from Syracuse, said. “If you know that, you should be able to deal with that situation accordingly.”

Will Cuomo keep pushing his agenda? With an eye toward possible re-election in 2018 or a presidential campaign in 2020, Sheinkopf said it almost doesn’t matter. Cuomo already has racked up bipartisan achievements, he explained, so issues that rally the Democratic base (but aren’t enacted into law) are arguably more useful than additional achievements.

“Reaching across the aisle as a principle is a great thing, but blaming the opposition party for not working with you is also a great thing,” he said. “He can have it both ways.”

There’s also sufficient space between Cuomo and Clinton that he won’t be damaged by her loss. The governor endorsed the former senator from New York and secretary of state immediately upon her entry into the race — a move fueled by a desire to jump ahead of the governor’s foe, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio — and was a dutiful surrogate in the run-up to Clinton’s April 19 primary win over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Cuomo, though, also flirted conspicuously with Vice President Joe Biden when he was considering a late-entry into the race. His efforts for Clinton, perhaps by bilateral agreement, were confined to the borders of the Empire State — where her victory was assured. In August and early September, before revelations of Trump’s misogyny that many thought would finish him, Cuomo held back from attacking him.